MANILA – The Duterte administration’s economic managers recently called for a more resilient and adaptive agriculture sector, especially when it comes to extreme weather events, in keeping up with demand and ensuring price stability in the market.
“The economic team continues to push for the full implementation of non-monetary and administrative measures to stave off possible supply bottlenecks that have caused prices of key agricultural commodities to surge last year,” Finance Secretary Carlos Dominguez III, Socioeconomic Planning secretary Ernesto Pernia, and Budget secretary Benjamin Diokno said in a joint statement.
“There is a resounding consensus among members of the Economic Development Cluster that the agriculture sector needs greater attention now more than ever,” the statement read.
“The agriculture sector must work towards resiliency and be adaptive to extreme weather events.”
The Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) reported earlier Tuesday that inflation settled at 4.4 percent in January.
The keep inflation slowing down, economic managers want the agriculture sector to ensure sufficient supplies in meeting demand even amid extreme weather conditions as part of keeping prices manageable.
The local agriculture sector grew by 0.8 percent in 2018, compared with 4.0 percent in 2017, largely due to typhoons.
“We urge the Department of Agriculture to facilitate a comprehensive crop management system to align farming activities with prevailing supply-demand conditions and weather patterns,” the economic managers said.
“In the fisheries sector, sustainable management of coastal and other marine resources should be intensified, more so with the reported decline in available fish in open waters,” they added. (GMA News)
